AN INFORMIX WISH LIST - DRAFT - NOT FINAL TILL JULY 18, 1997

INFORMIX WISH LIST 07/01/97 DRAFT :-) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- The following wishes are a collection and summation of request from Informix Users around the globe. They are edited for formatting, where salutations and non-related commentary have been removed. In many cases the commentary was preserved in its' entirety. If you feel the commentary that was omitted should be preserved, please contact me immediately. In this case we can reconstitute the same or better comments. Many of these requests are preserved in their entirety in comp.databases.informix. --Tim Schaefer ( tschaefe@mindspring.com ) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 Port ODS 7.x, 4GL, SE, ISQL, ESQL/C to Linux. Charge $300.00 US for it. Make it available via FTP, and CD. Write supporting manuals and documentation for it. Time the release with the most current stable release of Linux. 2 Shrink-wrap New Era. Charge something similar to other products like it, say around $99.00 US. Make it available via FTP. Drop the run-time licensing fees. 3 Set up an "Informix University" in every major city where there is an Informix market. This is a training lab where affordable training and seminars are offered for Informix Users. 4 Start a series of either on-going or periodic training seminars for every city where there is a significant Informix market. Make 'em cheap. Have Informix authors show up at the seminars. Have third-party commercial product suppliers show up at the seminars. 5 Port Universal Server to Linux. Make it available like OWGS. Make it inexpensive. 6 Set up low-cost direct-call support for either one-time help or low cost warranty for small customers. ( i.e. 30-60-90-120-day, etc. support contracts ) 7 Sell ALL your documentation in mainstream bookstores, at mainstream prices. Have an optional CD of all the documentation. 8 Think about the future. Have a complete scalable office hardware solution in the form of an Informix Server, and NC terminals. ( This IS a wish-list! ) If Oracle can have hardware you can too. Just do it better. Sell it like phone equipment. Price it like a commodity. 9 Fix 4GL and adopt the changes proposed long ago by others here. 10 Update your web page to reflect a more active, dynamic organization. 11 Adopt a more aggressive marketing campaign, similar to your competition. Embrace developers and end-users as the first-line of your marketing reach. Be the leader you are supposed to be. 12 Improve Online installation. 13 Network. rewrite it from grounds up 14 Informix should simplify the product offerings, why not have most everything needed for a modern set up (WEB, Client/server, tools, and networking) in one offering? 15 Second, what is with the installation? Why can't I upgrade my engine without re-installing my tools? I know the rule of TEN, but it seems silly that an install script can't sort out the different binaries associated with the different products 16 Feature Request (#71281): A function (similar in use to "extend") is needed to handle UTC time directly from SQL. Usage should be something like: select LOCAL_DATE(utc_column, year to second) from . . . The function should automatically determine offset from GMT in the same manner as the OS, be year 2000 compliant, and take an integer column as input. I realize that something similar could be cooked up with a SPL, but I want to avoid the overhead associated with a system call. 17 Make the Informix CD-DOC available in HTML format. 18 I'd like to see Informix supported on the low-end platforms like Linux, but also on Win95 as well as NT, and Sco (versions 3.2.4+ and above), both as a networked db and as a stand-alone. Asking for Novell support may be taking this a bit far, but it could pose a threat to competition like MS SQL server and Sybase, not to mention the very low end attempts at multi-user, databases like Fox Pro, Dbase, Access (?!!) running on a small office network. There are zillions of small offices and departments like the places I work with whose needs grow quickly over time, where scalability would be appealing. The downside of this feature is support. And yes, I have heard WGS will now run in the Sco Unix environment. 19 Concentrate on the main product: the Informix database! Most of us are convinced that it is good, in fact better than the competition, but some like myself fear that product diversity has threatened the main focus. 20 Get 4GL suitably updated with a rich set of features and, decent support for Windows clients....or provide a c/s tool that can compete effectively with the c/s tools out there....or better connectivity to the good tools C++, Delphi, Powerbuilder etc....I don't really care which. 21 Provide more information on the query profile (aka Set Explain) in the SMI. 22 Provide an option for cumulative total for light scans.... 23 Make people more aware of the informix certification program (this exists in the UK I think, don't know if it is anywhere else). Maintain a certified professionals list that individuals and companies can be listed on for a small fee. The list should include details of what the individuals/companies have been certified to do. The list should be freely available to any organisation that uses informix. 24 With new products, provide certification programs that include a copy of the s/w at the end of the course for all attendees. 25 Provide low cost 2 user licences of the online engines for all PC based O/S that the company supports (SCO give their O/S away free to individuals). 26 Another useful venture would be to work with Microsoft to enable Transaction Server to talk to an informix database . 27 upper/lower 28 preview of estimated costs 29 SP returning more than 1col/row 30 sqexplain logs with watermarks for costs and uid 31 anything better than ontape/onarchive 32 installation & networking simplified/improved 33 CLI/ODBC security enhanced 34 complete manuals in HTML format 35 perl with DBD:DBI included in the distribution 36 SP language widely enhanced, execution plans covering SP calls ... 37 Has 'long table and column names' been added yet? Also, full SQL-92 compliance? Or, at least, DESCRIBE {INPUT|OUTPUT} for ESQL/C? 38 An attribute in .per forms which will right justify character strings. I know I've wanted this before, and I just needed it again today. Now I have to append the correct number of spaces onto the beginning of the string. Messy. 39 'IN' and 'NOT IN' syntax which allows more than one field, which would make many correlated subqueries obsolete, and SQL statements more efficient, e.g.: select * from this_table where field1, field2 in (select field1, field2 from that_table) 40 A